The invention relates to a refrigeration device with a first component having an elongated seal element in the form of a hollow profile for thermal sealing against the second component, with the seal element having a hollow profile featuring an elongated materially-rigid seal base and an elongated materially-elastic seal head attached thereto.
In refrigeration devices such as bottle storage cabinets, especially wine cabinets, at least two storage compartments with different cooling temperatures are normally present. In such cases the two storage compartments are separated from one another by an interior divider or a partition wall. To enable any remaining gap between the front face side of the dividing wall and the door of the refrigeration device to be thermally sealed, an elongated seal element in the form of a hollow profile is usually provided on the edge of the door facing towards the partition wall, i.e. uniform, i.e. being made from the same soft-elastic plastic material in its entirety. The seal effect between the seal element attached to the front edge of the partition wall is especially provided by the materially-elastic deformable, soft hollow profile part of the seal element being slightly compressed when the door is closed. This seals any edge gap between the inner wall of the door and the partition wall and thus ensures thermal sealing between the storage compartments to be cooled separately.
If this type of seal element in the form of a hollow profile has open ends this is frequently aesthetically unsatisfactory, particularly if the door includes a transparent window. If the ends of the elongated seal element in the form of a hollow profile are welded closed, this is likewise aesthetically unsatisfactory. In addition air cannot escape from the hollow profile of such a seal element, which can adversely effect sufficient compression of the hollow profile of the seal element by the closed door.
The sealing of the edge gap between partition wall and door can especially in the long edge area, i.e. in the vicinity of the ends of the hollow profile, i.e. where the door closes against the chassis of the refrigeration device or is hinged onto it, can be critical because of different compression forces of the door and/or because of different forms of inner contour of the edge gap. Thus for example the inner surface of the door facing towards the seal element in the form of a hollow profile can run unevenly, especially bent or curved over the entire length of the seal element. Particularly in the vicinity of the ends of the hollow-profile seal element the inner surface of the door can mostly be more or less heavily contoured. Frame elements are often present on the side edges of the door which can exhibit a different contouring compared to the viewing window of the door. Such frame elements of the door can sometimes even protrude inwards on the partition wall to slightly opposite the plane of the position of the door window. Because of the accompanying contour changes of the intermediate space between the edge of the partition wall and the door in the respective long side area and/or different compression forces of the door along the longitudinal extent of the edge of the partition wall, in practice the ends of the sealing element have previously been either set with a gap to the respective side edge of the door whereby the seal effect is reduced there in the edge area; or in the closing area of the door and/or in the hinged area of the door the free, open ends of the seal element in the form of a hollow profile are closed with the aid of glued-on soft elastic terminating caps of which the outer contour or profile form can be adapted in accordance with the respective gap conditions present in the edge area, i.e. in the area of the two long edges of the door. In practice the gluing-on of such a soft, flexible termination cap to the respective open end of the seal element in the form of a hollow profile can however be rendered more difficult since the plastic material of seal element and terminating cap is soft and yielding, which makes it more difficult to handle during manufacturing or assembly of the seal.